The next night in the cave Batman was called to see something on Wayne's large commputer screen.
"What's this?"
"A name."
"Angel Proctor? Isn't she a tv host or something? Has a perfume line?"
"The one. Here's her address on the screen. Check it out, it's something fishy I ran across while looking at the bank accounts of some of Gotham's rich and famous. There may be an embezzlement scheme going on somewhere and her checking account may be invloved."
"She a victim?"
"That's what you get to find out. She could just be the unlucky dupe whose being used or the grand schemer in all of this. Barbara asked me check out for her, she's busy with gang wars."
"She got anything to do with our puzzle?" came to the boy as an afterthought.
Wayne looked at the Bat. "For the sake of my sanity, I hope not."
"So can we go?" A young blonde teenager sighed to her boss.
"No, we still need her!"
"Angel baby, give it a break. We don't even know who she is." A brunette girl answered.
Angel Proctor eyed her "associates" Lisa and Kelli.
The trio were discussing plans the Monday night following the holiday weekend in Angel's spacious condo between uptown and downtown where she worked in the den. The girls played a round of pool as they endured Angel's raving.
"A black girl with pink hair isn't as hard to miss." Angel added.
"So we what? Go looking for her? Make posters?" Lisa brushed a flaxen strand away.
"I have street sources. This set of Jokers can find her better than I can. From what I heard, she's been one of their targets before." The vid host smiled, happy with herself.
"Whatever, I say it's stupid." Kelli shot the solid into the hole. "The last set lost her."
"We have a better chance of doing it, you lose money every time you have pay them even if they're empty handed."
Lisa said then cursed low, Kelli had the upper hand her in billiards.
Angel Proctor was a woman of control: Losing control met she would lose her head.
The psych. grad of Gotham U. had found her niche in a on-air vid talk show about love–giving advice, consoling the broken-hearted. She was the "Dear Abby" of the future with a better hair color. . . .
But her charisma and double D chest were only taking her so far.
Her business ventures with the marketing of the perfume and bath products left her in debt.
Her show, still popular in the eyes of many, was failing. The network gracious gave her one more season before they would yank the plug. WTIL's shareholders were along the old money crowd who didn't know how people worked, she thought, they couldn't recognize serving to the masses' stupidity and smut was their cash cow.
So Angel's plan came out of necessity and old fashion greed.
Her answer: Steal. Robbing the wealthy would fix her problems, even exact a little revenge.
Her plan was golden.
But like every villain, she had dumb lackeys to contend with.
"Angel. Look, we've . . ." Lisa tried to reason but got cut off.
"Haven't done anything! If you two would have watched what you were doing in the first place, I wouldn't be so hot to find this girl. Besides, you two dropped the ball on both of our previous targets."
They dropped the ball on Wilson by him being in the same mall the pink haired was in that faithful day she insured Angel and again with Walker at the party. How could the same girl be in two places twice?
The vid host brushed a stray hair out of the way. "I'm going to get my beauty rest. We still have perfume to push and an evil plot to pull off."
She burn her icy hazel stare into both of them.
"Find the pink hair."
The door's slam announced how joyous she was feeling.
"Yes ma'am." Lisa answered, then out of ear shot mumbled under her voice, filing her nails.
"Overbearing witch."
Lisa scratched the eight ball, allowing Kelli the chance for the winning shot.
"We could be knocking over banks for all this work."
"That little pill we slip them makes guys do anything we say for as long as we want them to. If we can just focus, we can get this to work." Kelli pointed her stick Lisa.
"Didn't you let the Wilson kid go when we were working the mall." Lisa added meanly.
"I saw a vintage Gap sale! I couldn't miss that!" Kelli cried, then added pointedly. "Besides, if you weren't flirting with some kid on his date-"
"I was trying to work all the loaded guys in the room. He had a private room, private! And his own credit card, he's working for one of those really big conglomerates like Wayne-Blight Enterprises."
Lisa watched Kelli land the eight ball. Cursing, Lisa grudgingly handed her partner a twenty, then spoke. "He didn't look like a kid anways, he was cute."
The two girls looked more like high school cheerleaders than common crooks, yet had enough street smarts to con their way into favor. The hired help worked at the mall but stumbled on the Luv Doctor's little plan a month back. This mistake became their "opening" for some cash flow.
"What does that have to do with the pink hair?"
"They fell for her. That's why Ang's so ticked. We didn't let the drug work right, they were suppose to fall for us but we didn't say in their line of sight long enough."
"So how we gonna find her?"
"Are you just that ditzy?" Kelli smacked Lisa in her head.
"The Jokers tell us where she's at then we get her."
"Oh."
Lisa rubbed the back her head, forcing herself to stay calm.
"Either way, we get ours. The Luv Doctor gonna pay us or she'll get pay back. We'll be so friggin' paid, the girls down at juvie wouldn't know what to do . . . ."
"You just make sure you don't go sleep tonight." Lisa bared her fist at Kelli.
"Oh really-" The brunette's smug words were cut off by a masked figure.
"Where's Angel Proctor?"
"What the–" The brunette dropped her stick.
The figure started walking closer. "You heard me, where is Angel Proctor?"
"Somewhere." Her blonde cohort answered smartly.
"Funny." It sneered, "Just as funny as ripping off the rich."
The blonde cursed softly, "He knows!"
"Quiet stupid!" The smart mouth yelled back.
"Oh, so you do know something about it. I guess it does pay to easesdrop. Maybe we all should talk a nice walk to the police station and then we all can know more." It commented.
"Or not–!"
Within an eye's blink, Kelli came at Batman with a pool stick flying at his head.
"Slaggit!" Batman hissed, ducking the quick swings with a matching lighting speed.
"I don't want to hurt you. . ."
"Then you don't want to fight-hah!" She swung again, connecting with his back.
He went down hard, swearing.
"Lisa, could you jump in here!"
Her friend started backing out of the room.
"Nawww, you got it Kel, I gotta grab Ang anways. Cya when your done playing!"
"Stupid! Come back!"
Batman was on his feet again. The girl broke another pool stick over her thigh.
"Alright, I'll handle you alone."
"Sure you're not going to beat with up with you pom-poms?" He mocked.
His choice of words lead the two into a furious round of swings and kicks, ducking and dodging.
Vases broke, glass shattered, body parts felt blows.
He couldn't guess she knew how to fight but she did well to knock him down a few good times.
While hitting women wasn't his style, defense moves flew out of the window the minute the stick nearly connected with the crotch.
"Oops." Kelli taunted. "Missed."
Now the Bat was ticked.
"I don't fight girls." He growled. She swung high when his arm deflected the blow. "But you're not being a lady." The Bat gave a low kick, knocking her down. She crashed into the coffee table and cracked it in two. The one called Kelli suddenly yelped in pain.
"You broke my nail."
With a loud, savage cry the first girl flew at him, beating him repeatedly. Striking at his head, his legs, any part of him. Batman grabbed her by the wrists, weary of the game.
"Let me go and I'll think about sparing you!"
He began to bend her arms backwards, "this kinda brings 'twisting your arm' closer to home."
"Ah! Cut it out you dreg!"
"Not until you tell me what you know about Proctor's bank account."
"I don't know nothing!"
Batman pinned her down into the carpet, sitting on her legs.
"I seem to recall you saying something about being paid. Now, whose getting paid-Angel Proctor or you two? Whose double crossing who?" Something on the table caught his eye.
He tied the girls hands behind her back with a bolas before getting up.
The Bat quickly began leafing through the pile. Names of prominent businessmen and (only male) millionaires were popping up on the papers along with large amount of money being transferred or being signed over to a single bank account. One belonging to a certain vid-tv personality at WTIL.
He slipped two of the statements plus a darker piece of paper in his pockets.
"Bank statements huh? You didn't tell me how good you were with other's people's money–huh?"
Another paper stood out in his view, similar to the darker one. He started reading.
"Animal Farms Fertility . . .?"
Batman didn't get to finish his words when a wooden card chair came crashing across his back from a certain blonde. . . .
"You two are starting to become the biggest thorns in my side."
The Luv Doctor growled from the driver's seat of her black SUV. The girls were in the back, being tossed around by the doctor's frantic getaway driving. The three escaped with some of the evidence.
"Angel, I didn't spill!" Kelli screamed. "I swear!"
"Kel wouldn't do that to 'ya, Ang. We're in this together." Lisa defended her in a surprise move.
They had their differences, but friendship held priority over their boss. Angel only sneered.
"First off, get rid of the statements." She ordered. "Like you should have two weeks ago."
The two girls began to tear apart the statements, burning the pieces.
The vid host grinded her teeth, "We got to move ASAP. If Batboy knows something, then that means that the cops could too. So we better get this going."
She pulled out her cell phone.
"Change of plans. We're getting the pink hair tonight, take her out, and get out of town. We have enough money to sustain us and enough materials to make a new batch of the pills. I'll just make sure it's known that our kiosk 'suddenly' went out of business."
She began to dial numbers then indicated to the black clothing in the back.
"I suggest you two ladies get ready to visit our old friend. I have Jokerz to call."
Bruce Wayne wrapped Terry's back in thick white cloth. "How do you feel?"
The boy sat there, without a cowl, stripped of his top.
"Embarrassed."
He fought his urge of smirk. "You had a hard week."
"Would the world just be a better place without women?"
Bruce hid his smile as he continued to patch up his employee. Terry suddenly reached into his costume's pocket. "Oh here, she knows something. And they may be the pieces in our puzzle."
Batman handed his employer piece of papers. Wayne read over the bank statements for a length then raised an eyebrow at the last, darker paper. "A bill?"
"From a chemical company that specializes in animal fertility."
"How did you know that?"
"Let's just say I beat up a girl to find this information."
His boss leaned in closer to hear the rest of Terry's theory.